What a Strange Way I Have to Take to Meet You! is a 45′ long multimedia piece for a small ensemble, electronics and video. The video material is based on excerpts and stills from Robert Bresson’s “Pickpocket” – 1959 black & white film based around the themes of pickpocketing, morality and guilt. Having singled-out the frames and sequences of the movie that directly show the acts of stealing, I have combined them with a set of texts assembled from tourists books, in particular – advice for tourist on how not to get pickpocket. As well as that I have used some excerpts and illustrations from various books and guides of pickpocketing. After assembling these texts, I have erased particular nouns and verbs, which transformed the sentences into rather abstract and open-ended linguistic constructs (for instance “Avoid carrying sentimental value” or “If you cannot help but visit a foreign place, create an invisible zone of distance between you and others“).

“Imagine a pickpocket, quietly strolling through an unknown, crowded city, carefully looking for people to participate in his fatal show. What about his eyes, do you really think they are full of guilt? He is convinced he is about to do you a favour; some things go unappreciated though.“

“- In any case, even the most skillful pickpocket won’t help humanity progress.
– I never said that. It’s absurd.
– Tell me, do you think there are many around?
– Many of whom?
– Those supermen of yours.
– Who can say? They don’t get caught.
– But you claim those people exist. Perhaps you know one?
– If I did, I wouldn’t tell you.”